Yuan Lu is an Associate Professor in Systemic Change at the department of Industrial Design (ID), Eindhoven University of Technology (TU/e).  Since June 2021, she has become the director of education for the bachelor and graduate program at ID.  Lu is interested in exploring the use of design probes to create innovation opportunities and support design decisions with multi-stakeholders. She aims at creating intelligent products, systems and related services for healthy and active ageing.  
She has led and participated in some related national and EU research projects, including the Crisp Grey but Mobile project (2011-2015) and the Horizon 2020 REACH project (2016-2020). She actively participates in the national collaboration EWUU, an academic alliance between Wageningen University of Research (WUR), University of Utrecht (UU), University Medical Center Utrecht (UMCU) and TU/e. She also collaborates closely with Maxima Medical Center (MMC) on improving the cardiac rehabilitation program through promoting healthy lifestyle behaviors. 

Yuan Lu holds a BSc and MSc in Mathematics from Xi’an Jiaotong University in China (1995). She also holds an MSc in Engineering from the National University in Singapore (1999). She is the first joint PhD between National University of Singapore and Eindhoven University of Technology. After obtaining her doctorate, Lu joined TU/e as Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Technology Management. In 2008, she became Assistant Professor in the Industrial Design department of TU/e, and in 2012 she became Associate Professor.   In addition to her appointment at TU/e, she has been a Visiting Associate Professor at the International Design Institute at Zhejiang University in China between 2011-2018. She was appointed as a Visiting Associate Professor in Taiwan Tech in 2016, and a Guest Professor at School of Software Technology at Zhejiang University in China since Nov 2017. 

Next to her academic function at the department, she started the education squad on design for healthy and active ageing (2015-2017) where she together with her PhD students tried to integrate research into education projects. She has been also actively involved in supporting the daily operation of the sub-department Business Process Design (BPD). She has been acted as the deputy head for BPD for two years, between 2010-2011 and 2013-2014 respectively. She has been also a member of the faculty council from 2010 to 2011, a member of the education committee from 2013 to 2014, and a member of the faculty graduate school admission committee from 2014-2021. Until June 2021, she acted as the education coordinator at the sub-department of Systemic Change (SC). Since June 2021, she has become the director of education for both the bachelor and graduate program at ID.

In addition to her appointment at TU/e, she has been a Visiting Associate Professor at the International Design Institute at Zhejiang University in China between 2011-2018. She was appointed as a Visiting Associate Professor in Taiwan Tech in 2016. She has been appointed as a Guest Professor at School of Software Technology at Zhejiang University in China since Nov 2017. She has been also a member of the advisory board to the Province Brabant in the area of Healthcare since March 2017.